Digitisation: Akhilesh seeks deadline extension by six months

LUCKNOW: Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav has requested the Centre to extend the digitisation deadline for his state by six months.

In a letter to Minister of State (Independent Charge) for I&B Manish Tewari, Akhilesh said seven UP cities have been chosen in the second phase of digitisation. These cities are Lucknow, Kanpur, Varanasi, Agra, Ghaziabad, Meerut and Allahabad.

He said that after March 31 analog broadcast in these cities would stop and it would be available through digital addressable system.

The CM said price of set-top boxes (STBs) were increasingly continuously as there was a supply shortage. In addition to this, there was resentment among the public that they would not be able to watch cable television due to non-availability of STBs and analog transmission would stop from March 31.

As digitisation work was only 50 per cent complete in most of the cities, he said, more time should be given to the state. In the meantime, analog transmission should not be stopped, he added.